
i*>i?A'!r-^ift«?'<?<r-KS-;i?JS^,%is%*sg; 



IThe I 

I I 

leeting-House 

llNGHAM 

? Anniversary 



168;^. ---1882 







Presented by the Parish. 



DISCOURSE 



DELIVERED TO 



THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM 



TWO HUNDREDTH ANNIVERSARY OF THE OPENING 
OF ITS MEETING-HOUSE FOR PUBLIC WORSHIP. 



f 



DISCOURSE 



DELIVERED TO 



THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM 

ON THE 

CVuo l^untJiTtiti) ^funiliersarp 

OF THE 

OPENING OF ITS MEETING-HOUSE 
FOR PUBLIC WORSHIP. 

Sunday, January 8, 1882. 
By rev. EDWARD AUGUSTUS HORTON. 

Wlii\) an appcntiii. 



HINGHAM: 

PUBLISHED BY THE PARISH. 

1882. 





University Press : 
John Wilson and Son, Cambridge. 



CONTENTS. 



Page 

Discourse g 

Order of Services 47 



Church in Hingham, England 



Robert Peck 



53 
55 



The Communion Service 58 



Committee on publication, 

Arthur Lincoln. Quincy Bicknell. 

Henry C. Harding. Francis H. Lincoln. 



DISCOURSE. 



DISCOURSE. 



" God be with us as He was with our Fathers." i Kings, viii. 57. 

IVJO more expressive prayer could we offer this 
niorning than the one breathed by my text. 
God was with the little colony of heroic spirits who 
planted this town, and reared this meeting-house. We 
assemble to remember that Providential guidance, to 
revive the lustre of a noble history, and thus quicken 
all deep and noble sentiments. I cannot promise you 
I shall be brief, for that seems neither just to you nor 
to the subject. I will not impair the dignity and scope 
of my theme by headlong brevity. Two centuries we 
are to traverse, a marvellous record to revive ; there is 
justice to be done, and fit lessons are to be drawn. True, 
much of the historical material on which I must rely has 
been printed; but it is not accessible; the young know 
it not. From such sources I shall draw only those por- 
tions which seem necessary to the right proportion of 
my remarks. We may well linger, and spare not our 
words, as the two-hundredth anniversary of this ances- 
tral sanctuary passes by. Not for a half century 
probably will you have another important anniversary ; 
and so many of us will not be here ! Where is there 
an edifice of any kind in this land so thronged with 



lO THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

memories, so rich in associations, so suggestive to 
patriot, worshipper, poet, orator, or preacher ? Faneuil 
Hall speaks of patriotism ; the Old South recalls 
one era of religious struggle ; King's Chapel tells the 
first victory of Episcopacy in New England ; some old 
dwelling-house represents a distinct family ; but this 
structure is calculated, by past uses and scenes, — so 
varied, so significant, so far-extended, — to kindle every 
heart and stir the entire range of emotions. 

Without further preface let me proceed to the 
pleasant duty before us. With what a sigh we read 
that one, short sentence in Hobart's Diary, under date of 
January 8, 1681 :' "This Sabbath we first met in the 
new meeting-house." How much more we crave to 
know ! We know to-day what has been confirmed for 
some time, — thanks to the diligent investigations of 
lovers of history ! — that the old meeting-house which 
bore the palisade's protection, and had sufficed for the 
early life of Hingham, was outgrown ; that in decid- 
ing upon the best location for a new one, disagreements 
arose, and the state authorities intervened ; that at last 
the spot where we are assembled was chosen, and the 
work went forward. We know the names of those who 
had seats in the new house, and in what order. In a 
general way we can picture the interior. It was devoid 
of plastering, without a ceiling; there was but one pew 
in the whole house, the rest of the space being filled 
with benches ; there was no paint. We know that two 
children were baptized on that first Sunday, and their 

1 Old style. 



DISCOURSE. II 

names survive. We know that infants were often 
baptized the day they were born, and one of these 
babes may have received the holy rites on its natal day. 
There was a bell that summoned the worshippers. At 
first a drum had been beaten, or a shell blown, or a 
flag hoisted, to indicate the hour of service, but Hing- 
ham had long employed a bell. These are things 
within the pale of certainty. But beyond is the twi- 
light of conjecture. What was the text of Mr. Norton's 
sermon ? What psalms were sung ? Did any friends 
from other towns join the assembly } Was there an 
offering of the peoples money on that day.'* How was 
the service conducted, and in what features did it differ 
from ours to-day ? 

In response to these questions no distinct answers 
come back. Shall we give imagination permission to 
paint what history has not recorded ? For there can 
hardly be a more attractive subject for us this morning 
than the picture of the first religious service ever held 
in this venerable edifice. Let us fill out the unknown 
parts by touches of probability. Mr. Norton is the 
young minister; Peter Hobart died three years before 
this meeting-house was opened. There is strong proof 
that Norton preached his own ordination sermon, still 
preserved, which occurred two months before the aged 
Hobart died. As this Sunday dawns, two hundred 
years ago, the town wakes to an unusual stir and 
earnestness. The extremely aged exert their slumber- 
ing wills and go to the new meeting-house ; the young 
gaze with admiration at the structure ; a feeling of pride 



12 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

and a sense of gratitude rule in the mature men who 
have carried their hopes to completion. The minister 
comes. He wears a gown, for his scholarly tastes would 
lead him to do that. The robe among the Puritans 
was the scholar's garment, whether worn by judge, pro- 
fessor, or preacher. An hour-glass stands on the 
pulpit ; the people are all assembled ; a hush comes 
over the congregation. Mr. Norton rises and offers a 
prayer. It is the one long prayer in the whole service, 
delivered slowly, impressively. The pastor remembers 
the past and renders thanks for deliverance, for present 
blessings. He prays for many, very many things, for 
many, very many persons, — for the young, the old, the 
sick, the bereaved. The sands of the hour-glass run 
on and mark more than half an hour in time from the 
beginning of the prayer. It ends ; a man, the guardian 
of order in the assembly, steps forward and turns the 
glass, as it is out. It is evident that there are to be no 
dedicatory services. Our forefathers avoided even the 
suspicion of popish habits, and would not yield to 
sentiment in consecrating a building, lest it should 
seem like the superstition of the Mother Church at 
Rome. So the service proceeds as on any Sunday, 
unmarked save by the glow of feeling in every heart, 
and the universal tokens of newness. The reading of 
Scriptures follows. When ministers read the Bible 
in the pulpit, and did not explain as they went along, 
it was called "dumb reading." The people of Hing- 
ham were averse to it, as were most congregations ; so 
Mr. Norton expounds as he proceeds, and coming upon 



DISCOURSE. 13 

a passage which refers to God's reward of the faithful, 
he enlarges upon it, applying the text to the flock 
before him. A psalm is given out. There are no 
appointed singers, no instruments, no tune-books. 
The congregation, indeed, know but six or seven tunes, 
among them St. Martin's. These, however, they know 
well ; and as the psalm is lined, a resonant voice, near 
the deacons' seat, takes up the tune which all expect ; 
and the simple, grand notes go sounding up to the 
rafters, and thaw the chilly air, and set free the heart's 
pent-up emotion. In standing to sing, the congregation 
obtains some release from the cold conditions of the 
fireless room. In the only pew are Mrs. Peter Hobart 
and Mrs. Norton. The widow, it is noticed, becomes 
affected. No doubt memory is busy, and she thinks of 
her lost companion, who would have rejoiced to see 
this day and the glory of this house. At last the 
whole psalm has been sung, and the sermon follows. 
It is in substance, we may believe, an exhortation to 
remember the faith and be loyal to it. The wor- 
shippers are reminded that with a great price this 
liberty and true doctrine were purchased. They are 
bidden to shun all ease in Zion, now that this new and 
sumptuous sanctuary spreads such temptations to pride 
and satisfaction. The discourse was long, but Matthew 
Hawke did not preserve it in short hand, and we can 
only imagine its force and pertinency. Another psalm 
is sung, and after prayer the impressive benediction 
sends the large congregation away until the afternoon, 
— when the two children are baptized, one or two men 



14 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

speak after the sermon, and a collection is taken, the 
minister saying, " as God hath prospered you, so freely 
give." Such a picture may be drawn with every reason 
for believing in its truthfulness. 

Touching as the scene is, it receives an added pathos 
when we remember that our fathers had acquaintance 
with splendor. The old church at Hingham, England, 
and all the ancient glory of cathedral and minster in 
the Old Home were familiar to them. This simple 
structure had been hewn from the wilderness, not by 
barbaric hands, ignorant of taste, beauty, grandeur, 
but by those who, as they entered this house for the 
first time, realized deeply what they had paid for 
liberty of conscience and human rights. Yet they 
abated not one jot or tittle of courage and hope. 

It will be seen that the first service, in its essential 
characteristics, did not differ materially from ours to- 
day. 

Little thought Deacon John Leavitt and Deacon 
John Smith, as they sat in their prominent seats, centre 
of all eyes, that we, down the long vista of two centu- 
ries, would also look at them. The same names are 
represented in the pews this morning that were known 
then, — descendants in unbroken lines, one family 
having worshipped here consecutively for ten genera- 
tions. It seems as though but a few years had elapsed, 
and we were celebrating a recent event. The remote 
epochs rush together, true kinship of spirit asserts 
itself; and, instead of commemorating a dim, decayed 
and lustreless transaction, we seem to participate in the 



DISCOURSE. 15 

first religious service of this sanctuary. This, how- 
ever, is the uplifted mood of thought and sympathy, 
that transcendent power by which we ally ourselves 
with all that is noble and lovable in the past. Slowly 
we descend and touch again the facts, the outward 
realities of life. We are commemorating something 
which occurred so long ago that the mind grows be- 
wildered as it endeavors to trace the vicissitudes of 
the intervening decades. It will be profitable for us 
to recall some historic conditions which existed when 
these walls first rose. They are very interesting ; but 
they lead on to that more valuable story of what 
transpired in religious affairs after the meeting-house 
was opened. 

Soon after the erection of this meeting-house, 
progressive measures multiplied in New England, and 
ministers assumed new functions. Before 16S6, min- 
isters had been prohibited from performing the marriage 
ceremony. In that year, four years after the completion 
of this edifice, the Governor issued a proclamation 
authorizing ministers to share what before only the 
civil magistrates had liberty to do. Three years after 
this house was built, we find that a minister offered 
prayer at a funeral, — the first instance on record. The 
burial of the beloved dead had been a cold and sad 
transaction. Only the friends gathered at an appointed 
time in the home, and without prayer, without singing, 
without service of any kind, the body was borne to the 
grave and buried. The reasons for this custom were 
founded on a desire to show aversion to superstition. 



l6 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

It was held that prayer at a funeral might have an 
appearance of Popery, inasmuch as in the Romish 
Church prayers were said for the dead and over the 
dead. And the denial to the clergy of the right of sol- 
emnizing marriages arose from the same source, — that 
it might savor of a sacrament. These things were 
changing, and by the year 1700 sermons and prayers 
grew common at funerals. 

So, too, the temper and usage of the people were 
changing, two hundred years ago, from the early rigor. 
Preachers found fault with the evidences of taste and 
comfort already springing up in the more prosperous 
families. I doubt not the criticism was over-severe. 
Urian Oakes in his Election Sermon of 1673, — nine 
years before the opening of this meeting-house, — put 
forth this remark, which shows that the old-time 
preachers were often as sensational as the modern. 
He said: "When persons spend more time in trim- 
ming their bodies than their souls, then you may say of 
them, as a worthy divine wittily speaks, that they 
are like the cinnamon tree — nothing good but the 
bark." 

This trait grew so prominent in the custom of giving 
gloves and rings and scarfs at funerals, that a law was 
passed, about forty years after the completion of this 
building, restricting excesses. A wise act, for we learn 
that at the funeral of Governor Belcher's wife over 
a thousand pairs of gloves were bestowed on relatives 
and friends. The ministers always had large stores of 
rings, gifts from bereaved parishioners. Humanity 



DISCOURSE. 



17 



is the same in all times. It has its excess under one 
form or another. While we marvel at the extravagance 
which led to such an abuse as this of old, we ourselves 
develop the same trait in the over-use of flowers at 
funerals, evoking requests on all hands to withhold 
them. 

It is often alleged that the Puritan was exceptionally 
rigid in his views of church-going, and that our New 
England laws were unusually severe. This is not so. 
The Cavalier in Virginia was more compulsory. In 
1 6 10 a law was passed that every colonist in Virginia 
should attend church twice every Sunday. Failing in 
this, for the first offence he must lose allowance for a 
week; for the second offence, lose allowance and be 
whipped ; for the third offence he should suffer death ! 
It is often supposed, too, that the Puritan was extremely 
Mosaic and terrible in his legal penalties for crime. In 
reality he was merciful compared to Old England, 
where, in the eighteenth century, as many as two hun- 
dred and twenty-three offences were punishable with 
death. The Puritan simply said to many offenders : 
" Depart ! go elsewhere ! take your life and try to make 
it better in some new place." 

Let us grant that the Puritans were strict. Had 
they not just cause ? The men of every era are to be 
judged by ^/leir environment, not by ours. What was 
the Puritans' situation ? 

They had everything at stake. To endanger the 
dear-bought privileges was beyond question a step no 
earnest man could permit. Children may be fickle 



l8 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

and inconstant of purpose, but not such iron wills as 
those that cleft the rock of old-time opposition and 
persecution. They were troubled, too, by bad charac- 
ters. Ever hovering about their village were such as 
had come from England hoping to live on the prosper- 
ity of the toilers and faithful. 

Again, our forefathers were logical. No fancy 
brought them here, no idle dream. Great hopes 
shone on their pathway, but they knew how each step 
must be taken. They have been criticised for demand- 
ing liberty of conscience for themselves, yet often 
denying it to others. Does not the same ground of 
accusation exist to-day? Can you support this church, 
and carry out the principle of liberty of conscience to 
any and every extent } Would you not be at war 
within yourself as an organization by permitting those 
to have power and sway in the administration of this 
parish who might deny, or ridicule, or ignore some of 
your fundamental beliefs ? You say to-day, as they 
said of old : " Go thy way ! Plant for yourself, build 
for yourself, — but do not enter in to reap where you 
have not sowed, or tear down what others have arduously 
built." The truth is that very much of the opprobrium 
cast on the Puritan for his supposed persecution of 
others arose more from civil complications than from 
religious quarrels. Roger Williams's notable case 
sprang more from his meddling with politics than from 
his divergence in the way of doctrine. Even in such 
instances, which would have been called treason in 
older countries, the Puritan magistrate simply ban- 



DISCOURSE. 19 

ished, simply cast out elements which he considered 
dangerous to the welfare of Church and State. 

Not to be forgotten is the final argument in the 
Puritan's behalf. He was a Calvinist. He was a part 
of that mighty movement which swept over Western 
Europe and rallied every man who " hated a lie." 
Calvinism was one of the most significant phases of 
the new life which has marked modern times. Tersely 
says Froude the historian : " Whatever exists at this 
moment in England and Scotland of conscientious 
fear of doing evil is the remnant of the convictions 
which were branded by the Calvinists into the people's 
hearts." Never will this spirit appear again in the harsh 
dreadful dogmas that appalled and enslaved the mind 
at times ; but wherever bold reformers strike, wherever 
the voice of a Carlyle is heard, wherever men say with 
Matthew Arnold that conduct is three fourths of life, 
wherever man is rallied to a high, overpowering sense 
of duty by an incarnated conscience, — there the spirit 
still exists that animated the Puritans. 

Neither was the Puritan so cheerless and smileless as 
superficial scrutiny reports. Even the pulpit ventured 
to be witt}^ Homes were scenes of merry-making ; 
youth had its games and recreative hours. Deacons 
played ball together, no longer than sixty years ago, on 
set days. The old thanksgivings were full of innocent 
frolic. The " morose, tyrannical, sour visage " tradition 
assigns to the typical Puritan is misleading. There 
were some of that cast, as there are now. It is a falla- 
cious course which leads one to interpret domestic life. 



20 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

social customs, and personal traits of any period by its 
printed creeds, or excessive sermons, or reactionary 
utterances. There was not enough sunshine in the 
Puritan's life, but there was a great deal ; and it steadily 
deepened as his lot was ameliorated. 

The fitness of Congregationalism for the creation 
of this Republic was never more powerfully proven 
than by that orator, Hon. Robert C. Winthrop, — our 
pride at Yorktown, himself a Churchman, — in his 
oration at Plymouth in 1870. It was the only system 
by which such a community as New England could 
have been organized. " From its fundamental thought 
that all Christian men are 'kings and priests unto God,' 
sprang popular government in Church and State." We 
are celebrating to-day not the death of the Puritan's 
idea and his system, but its fulfilment. Its principles 
are at the basis of every Protestant denomination in 
our land ; even the American Episcopal Church has 
engrafted some of its features on its polity. It is safe 
to say, viewing everything, — the people, their spirit, 
their system, — that God was with them peculiarly, 
making future results sure. 

I am not attempting to transform the defects of the 
Puritans into virtues. They were far from perfect. 
. But they seem to me providential men, set to do a 
work — none more difficult in all the world's history. 
Had they been characters less vigorous, less tenacious, 
less firm and severe, I know not what the history of 
this country might have been. It was this tremendous 
will that gave us Sam Adams, to face the foreign foe. 



DISCOURSE. 21 

It was this stern fidelity that gave us the Mathers, who 
from their pulpits made the people resolute and God- 
fearinq;. It ran like flame in the town-mcetines when 
fresh oppression came, and its avalanche-sweep bore 
down on the English troops at many a contested field. 
It is not for us to criticise the Puritan, but to look at 
him. and ask the question : Are we as faithful to the 
needs of our times ? 

The Pilo^rims and the Puritans came fi'om enlisfht- 
ened, progressive sources. Out of twenty-seven minis- 
ters settled at the same time in Massachusetts Bay 
Colony, Peter Hobart among them, fourteen had grad- 
uated from Cambridge, England, four had studied at 
Oxford, and the others were marked by capable minds. 
The laity were equally elevated in character, for it might 
be predicated, did we not know the names of many of 
them, that no body of men and women, ignorant and 
narrow, could support such a clergy, give them life, 
and live on their utterances. It must be remembered 
that our forefathers did not get away from discussion 
and peculiar views by coming to this continent. All 
the questions that agitate us either sprung up among 
them, or were brought over by new visitors. In 1648 
two Indians went to Providence and returned. As 
they were students under Eliot, the missionary, they 
reported to him the ideas they had heard. " How is 
it," they asked, " that with the same Bible, these people 
in Providence hold such different views firom our- 
selves } They say there is no hell or heaven except in 
bad or good people's hearts, that baptism of children 



22 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

is useless, that ministers and magistrates are need- 
less." Such extreme views were familiar enous^h. We 
must remember that a people with busy brains are 
always developing the same great issues in every age, 
under one form and another. Hingham had already 
commenced a revolt, in Hobart's day, and certain 
Church of England adherents were appealing to 
Parliament for their rights to Episcopal services. 

Andros,'the tyrannical, was after all the unconscious 
instrument of a great idea ; and while he troubled the 
Puritans, he effected freedom for King's Chapel, and 
widened liberty of worship. It was in 1700 that the 
Brattle Street Church of Boston was formed, after war- 
fare and bitterness because the new church would not 
promise to conform to every former doctrine and cus- 
tom. Why, when this building rose, the land was ripe 
for stirring changes. Fifty years had imparted an 
impetus to the Puritan ideas, and they were fulfilling 
their logical destiny. 

It is interesting to note how large a part the religious 
element assumed in the days we have been considering. 
In 1694 two sums were voted by this town for every 
public need: ^425 were appropriated for the support 
of the ministry, and only ^225 for all other expenses 
in the town ! Twenty years before this a law of the 
Commonwealth was in force that required every town 
to provide a dwelling-house for the minister. If the 
minister was not duly and adequately paid, each 
county court was required to take measures to have 
the deficiencies supplied. 



DISCOURSE. 23 

How completely from the beginning this meeting- 
house was the centre of civil and religious transactions 
in this town, is seen by a brief glance at the facts. 
The very Sunday on which the first service occurred, 
and these beams were echoing Gods praise, the 
hearts of the men were burdened with anxiety. The 
mother country was threatening to take away the char- 
ter of the colony, because of alleged misdemeanors, 
and with that charter went all titles and claims to the 
land on which homes and sanctuaries rested. These 
they had toiled for, and set like jewels in the wilderness. 
All New England was profoundly stirred. At last, 
when the threat was executed and the rights of the 
people swept away, a fast was proclaimed. Every 
meeting-house was filled with a sad, tearful, prayerful 
congregation. Of all those houses this is the only 
one now in existence, its walls made sacred by that 
bitter, indignant hour. Then followed town-meetings, 
held here, as they were for one hundred years. The 
people rallied. Those who rarely spoke here rose 
and offered the pungent advice, the sturdy sense, of 
their loyal hearts. Here were considered the grave 
questions of resistance, self-government, justice, liberty. 
Yes ! the first uses of this buildino: ^vere for such de- 
liberations as arise only when a people's precious 
privileges are in danger from tyranny, and the sky of 
the future is black with perils. This old meeting- 
house was baptized as the home of civil and ecclesias- 
tical liberty by the scenes which earliest transpired in 
it. On Sundays, beyond doubt, the preacher took his 



24 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

topic many times from the exciting, overshadowing 
themes of the week. He exhorted, he reasoned, he 
prayed, all for the endangered cause. And on that 
signal day in May, after years of anxiety and trial, 
when the men of Hingham gathered here and elected 
Daniel Gushing and Thomas Andrews to represent 
them in the Council of Safety, no doubt Norton was 
present, and invoked divine blessings on the bold act. 
It was a daring deed, — as direct a defiance of England 
as the Revolutionary measures. They risked all, 
those men of Hingham, then representing nearly two 
hundred families. Some had been in King Philip's 
War ; some were old, ready to leave the world, but not 
ready to go without a manly protest against wrong. 
All these veterans held not back from fresh dangers. 
It was so throughout the colony. Of all the buildings 
existing: at that time in which this heroic stand was 
taken, — which saved our land as much as the Revolu- 
tion, — the patriot finds only this one remaining, upon 
which he may cast his admiring look, and honor as he 
treads in reverential mood the spot consecrated by 
undaunted religious faith. 

Any expanded reference to the ministers who have 
served this parish is uncalled for, so familiar are their 
characters to you, — their long pastorates, their uniform 
excellence, their crowns of reward. Yet a quick 
review of some facts not generally known is fitting. 
Peter Hobart, who never entered this building, cannot 
be dissociated from it. He labored, and others 
entered into his labors. We all know the allusion on 



DISCOURSE. 25 

record to his boldness in speaking his mind. Cotton 
Mather says one or two other things about him which 
bring his character out more distinctly. He always 
studied standing, thinking that habit a more diligent 
and lively manner of improving time. If I mistake not, 
Calvin Lincoln had the same habit in a degree. We 
are also told that Mr. Hobart always heard the sermons 
of other ministers graciously, as though he truly 
worshipped God thereby, — a virtue in a preacher of 
highest rank, and in this case proving the truth of the 
oft-heard proverb, that the boldest speakers are fre- 
quently the most docile listeners. 

We must remember in our honor to Hobart that he 
gave several sons to the ministry, " worthy preachers," 
we are informed, in Cotton Mather's day. With Ho- 
bart was associated Robert Peck, teacher, for three 
years, from 1638 to 1641. This cultured man returned 
to England, and there resumed preaching.^ 

Of John Norton we have already spoken, — a faith- 
ful pastor, a gentle spirit, loving the mild, persuasive 
paths of his profession. We are not surprised to find 
that he stands forth the only poet in the list of minis- 
ters. His sermons are lost; less can be recalled of his 
pulpit utterances than of those of any other; but his 
poem on Anne Bradstreet gives him a place in the 
annals of American literature, and by that he lives in a 
national fame. Mr. Norton's pastorate covers that 
important period in our Colonial histoiy when a new 
people, so to say, came upon the stage. Up to the time 

^ See Appendix. 



26 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

this meeting-house was reared, the active men and 
women had been those born in England, — Ameri- 
cans, but emigrants. After 1682, we see the native- 
born Americans assuming control, — children of the 
New World, products of the environment, trained in 
the genius of the New World. They called England 
home, but had never seen it. 

Therefore, when Ebenezer Gay became minister, we 
find a more distinctively original w^ork going on. We 
are not surprised to learn that he was the first Unita- 
rian minister of New England. The criticism of him 
was not concerning what he preached, but what he 
omitted to preach. When Whitefield traversed the 
country with such remarkable commotions. Dr. Gay 
refused to invite him to Hingham. The parish wished 
to hear him, and appointed one man to see their pastor 
and persuade him to send an invitation. The result 
was that the subject was not even broached ; and the 
loyal man preferred to bear obloquy from his fellow 
parishioners, rather than elicit a distinct refusal from 
Dr. Gay, and so create a ferment in the parish. We all 
know Gay's ability; over a score of his sermons were 
printed, the " Old Man's Calendar," outranking them 
all. The oddity of the pulpit exists in all ages under 
some form, and is not peculiar to our age. Think of 
a text like this, used for a sermon by Dr. Gay, delivered 
before the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company: 
" I saw by night, and behold, a man riding upon a red 
horse, and he stood among the myrtle trees that were 
in the bottom ; and behind him were there red horses, 



I 



DISCOURSE. 27 

speckled and white." (Zech. I. 8.) Beyond doubt, Dr. 
Gay's strong mental power did much to mould the 
youth, elevate scholarly traits and perpetuate learning 
in a new civilization beset with material cares. The 
endowment of a professorship at Harvard College 
by Dr. Hersey, and the subsequent foundation by 
Madam Derby of an Academy in this town, may justi- 
fiably be traced to Dr. Gay's influence. 

Henry Ware came to this pulpit as the echoes of the 
Revolution were dying away ; when Hingham was 
rebuilding her fortunes, mourning for her dead, cele- 
brating her heroes, and, above all, glorying in the fame 
of her son, Benjamin Lincoln, the friend of Washing- 
ton, and one of the deacons of this church. In this 
house he was christened, and here his character was 
greatly moulded. Dr. Ware was pure, noble, devoted, 
spiritual. He was very difhdent, — always trembling as 
he commenced Sunday service. One habit of his stands 
out in striking contrast to the ministerial procrastina- 
tion of to-day. He never went to sleep Sunday night 
until he had secured his text and subject for the fol- 
lowing Sunday. 

In 1755, during his predecessor's pastorate, the inte- 
rior of this audience-room was greatly changed by the 
removal of the oaken benches, except in the centre of 
the floor, the substitution of high, square pews, together 
with some other alterations. Now, under Ware, a pro- 
posal was made to build a new meeting-house. This, 
fortunately, was not carried out, but important changes 
were made in the exterior appearance. In the midst 



28 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

of these changes, typical of the enlarged and more 
restless condition of the community, Dr. Ware accepted 
a professorship at Harvard, and resigned. To him 
succeeded Joseph Richardson. His pastorate began 
with the opening century, and terminated but a little 
over ten years ago. He was once elected to Congress. 
He was a man of strong feelings, which he ruled with 
a moral mastery. His knowledge of human nature 
was large ; his ability to deal with practical themes, 
exceptional. His power to console the sorrowing, and 
to recall the dead in tender expressions, was also 
marked. The path he trod was stormy in its inception, 
and it ended in a storm of physical infirmity; but 
candor, while it deals no more with the outgrown 
disputes of the past, will accredit Richardson with 
heroism, fidelity, self-control, and loyal service to this 
ancient parish. 

After Richardson, the man of fiery action, came 
Lincoln, the saint, long before the junior pastor and 
the chief worker. His loss is fresh in our memories, 
and his absence to-day casts its shadow on our exercises. 
Yet why should it ? Was not his death fitting in cir- 
cumstance, and beautiful ? I seem to feel his presence 
here ; I seem to have the support of his invisible par- 
ticipation. Under Calvin Lincoln another great change 
took place in this house, and the square pews were 
removed. To those who do not go back to the begin- 
ning of things, this alteration seems very innovating ; 
but let us remember that these present pews are nearer 
the original benches and seats of this meeting-house 



DISCOURSE. 29 

than the box pews. You have returned somewhat to 
the church of 1682. Calvin Lincoln needs no eulogy 
or description from me at this time and in this pulpit. 
He was a part of your homes, the life of this place. 
The young loved his benignant face, the aged cherished 
his kindly hand, the troubled were soothed by his 
gentle accents, and all men turned respectfully to the 
lischt of his character. Calvin Lincoln had from nature 
the gift of serene and spiritual traits. The honor to 
him is that he was generous in their employment, — 
never thinking selfishly of his own happiness, but from 
first to last a servant of God's truth and love ! 

Were there time, the roll of the laity should be 
called. The old Congregational democracy which 
ushered in this society has ever prevailed. Preacher 
and layman act on each other. Conspicuous, also, 
has been the career of woman in the past history of 
this meeting-house. No one has more feelingly or 
justly referred to this fact than he so recently taken 
from you, the Hon. Solomon Lincoln, when, in 1835, 
he eloquently paid tribute to the mothers of New 
England. Vividly he says: "When calamity hung 
over the hopes of your fathers in a heavy cloud, 
when desolating war carried dismay to the stoutest 
hearts, and the smoke of your villages almost darkened 
the horizon, when the war-cry of the savage brought 
terror to every fireside and crushed the hopes of affec- 
tion almost to despair, it was then that the boldest 
spirits were sustained, encouraged by the animating 
tones of woman's voice and the tender solicitudes of 



30 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

woman's heart." " Patriotism," he truly adds, " has no 
exclusive character." Even so, I echo, religion has 
no exclusive character. It finds its natural allies in 
woman's sentiments and devotion. It is she who keeps 
vigils that the Zion of her Church may prosper. It is 
she who responds to the Sunday bell and teaches its 
call to her children as heaven's invitation. It is she 
who preserves where innovation destroys, and who 
prays where others despair. 

This meeting-house has been a home. All that you 
mean by that word, a word of rich and unmeasured 
import, has been embodied in the career of this house, 
by loyal men and women. Think of the scenes it has 
witnessed ! The long procession of the two centuries 
passes through it. The babe is christened ; the same 
infant, grown old and at rest, is here borne out amid 
tears. The merry marriage has here shed its joy, — 
the public man received from this place his recognition, 
by a mourning community, of " well done, good and 
faithful servant." Here have been the sincere hand- 
shakings of thousands of Sundays, here the exposition 
of nearly every part of Scripture. At times the Holy 
Ghost has seemed to descend and sway the large con- 
gregation. John Cotton, as he preaches in 1684 for 
Mr. Norton, looks into the eyes of as faithful a band of 
colonists as can be found in history; and he who 
speaks to-day beholds worthy descendants of those 
loyal spirits. We are wont to point to the long dura- 
tion of pastorates in this parish ; there are some 
prolonged terms of service on the part of the laymen. 



DISCOURSE. 31 

Thomas Andrews was treasurer for forty-three years ; 
Ebed Ripley was treasurer thirty-five years; James S. 
Lewis was clerk for twenty-five years ; and your present 
efficient clerk has already served twenty years. Within 
the last fifty years you recall Deacon Hobart, Deacon 
Ripley, — pillars in the church, untiring servitors. I 
would it were in my power to summon forth some of 
the men and women on whose shoulders the Ark rested 
in the days past. To them the ministers turned for 
advice and encouragement ; for their presence in 
church each Lord's day, the preacher eagerly looked ; 
at their firesides the pastor told his story, and patted 
the children kindly on the head. Yes ! there must 
have been ever a noble laity in this town, — thought- 
ful, patient, God-fearing, and earnest. So may the 
story always be ! 

I give place here to a list of the deacons of the First 
Church in Hingham since the opening of this house. 
Men occupying such positions had, in old times, large 
influence and reputation. In many instances they 
were, next to the minister, ruling powers and guides in 
church affairs. 

^ John Leavitt, the ancestor of all of that name in 
this town; John Smith, also known as Captain, an 
efficient officer in King Philip's War; David Hobart, 
son of Rev. Peter Hobart, and father of Rev. Nehemiah 
Hobart, first minister of Cohasset ; Benjamin Lincoln, 
for a long time town clerk ; Joshua Hcarsey; Solomon 
Cushing; Joshua Hearsey ; Josiah Lincoln; Thomas 
Andrews; Joseph Thaxter ; Benjamin Lincoln, Major- 



32 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

General in the Revolutionary Army ; Benjamin Gush- 
ing; William Gushing; Thomas Fearing; Caleb Ho- 
bart, who served in the Revolution; Nehemiah Ripley; 
Galeb Hobart, son of the previous deacon of the same 
name. Fearing Burr, Henry Siders, and Henry G. 
Harding, are those now appointed to carry the emblems. 
It is an inspiring thought to me that I am not cele- 
brating the end of greatness, but its sustained and 
ever-widening orbit. In these later years we may 
proudly parallel the events of the early days. This 
auditorium witnessed, a few years ago, a scene as 
impressive as any that ever occurred within its walls. 
The space was packed with human beings, all moved 
by one impulse, to render tribute to a good man. 
When Albert Fearing was buried from this place, the 
representative elements of this town and the Gommon- 
wealth assembled, not to honor mere fame, adventi- 
tious wealth, or glory, but to express love and reverence 
for a philanthropist, — one whose benefactions to this 
society are embodied in ampler privileges and security. 
He was one of you, and honors your record. When 
John A. Andrew's grave was to be adorned by that 
triumph of sculpture which Gould wrought, into this 
house the ardent, thrilled audience thronged. Memo- 
rable the day also, and the scene, when the "Ancient 
and Honorable Artillery Gompany " gathered in this 
church to pay tribute, not alone to historic memories as 
venerable as its own, but to recall worthy leaders who 
once worshipped here. And here the last, affectionate 
words were spoken to a sympathetic assembly, over the 



DISCOURSE. 33 

mortality of him who was Hingham's leading citizen 
for so many years, — Solomon Lincoln, who at the age 
of twenty-three wrote the history of Hingham, and the 
previous year gave the oration on Independence Day. 
The good name of your town was dear to him, and he 
maintained its reputation in many striking ways. We 
cannot forget, among the undying scenes enacted here, 
one which the future historian will dwell upon, — that 
day, that hour, when your beloved pastor received the 
angel of a new life and heard his message here, in 
the midst of supplications for our country and its 
honored President. How the hands of loving parish- 
ioners carried him forth to his home, and the day of 
his burial drew a throng of sincere mourners, — all this 
is so recent and vivid as to cause emotion. 

No tongue or pen will ever tell the tale of those 
myriad impressive personal experiences which, from 
the Sabbath two hundred years ago, have continued ; 
but immortal memories have borne them on into 
eternity. Who shall dare measure the extent of evil 
checked and goodness advanced by the offices of this 
sanctuary, — of burdens lightened, tears stanched, 
hope quickened, misery alleviated, doubt removed, 
heroism inspired, truth instilled ? God knows ! And 
to Him at this hour we reverently give thanks for the 
marvellous private, personal soul-history this event 
commemorates ! 

When this meeting-house was located it stood in 
the midst of the population. There was also as much 
wealth one side as the other. But time changed this ; 

3 



34 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

new precincts were formed, and gradually new meeting- 
houses arose. Do not imagine that a dead uniformity 
characterized this part of the South Shore. In Scituate, 
Parson Chauncy, afterward President of Harvard Col- 
lege, practised immersion and divided the parish ; but 
when he accepted the presidency he promised to abstain 
from disseminating his peculiar views. Whether he 
grew tired of his first opinions, or the new office con- 
verted him, I know not. Hingham sent a peacemaker 
to Scituate, who reconciled the factions, and he — 
Nicholas Baker — became their minister. The history 
of the successive societies you know. It is enough to 
say that the mother church had no ill-feeling except 
in one well-known case. If there was a reluctance to 
let the children go, at any time, it arose from some 
complication of taxes, or from an unwillingness to see 
the old parish weakened. But Providence has favored 
you, and while contributing to the inauguration of new 
parishes, bone of your bone, and blood of your blood, 
your own strength has been unimpaired. 

Under some circumstances it might be profitable to 
you and obligatory on me to trace the doctrinal history 
of this church. But there are certain reasons why 
such a recital, except in a very general way, has no 
special fitness in a rapid review of the history of the 
Old Meeting-house. This pulpit and this people have 
never waged any theological battles. This church 
never had a creed. Its first covenant was a simple 
avowal of Christian fellowship and Christian disciple- 
ship. In this respect it followed a course similar to 



DISCOURSE. 35 

many of the early churches. The test of membership 
in the church was chiefly one of character. I have 
already stated that Dr. Gay was the first minister in 
New England in whose preaching we find evidence of 
a change from Calvinistic tenets. It is very striking 
that King's Chapel, under Rev. James Freeman, was 
the first church to array itself openly on the side of 
Unitarianism. King's Chapel was the creation of 
Andros and his fellow worshippers, who instituted the 
first organized Episcopal or Church of England ser- 
vices in New England. King's Chapel was the Tory 
Church for a long time ; but in 1787 it became openly 
Unitarian. Still, to Hingham and to this meeting- 
house and to Dr. Gay, over fifty years before, belongs 
the credit or discredit, as may be viewed, of initiating 
the sentiments and principles which lie at the head- 
sources of the Unitarian movement in New England. 
I have not the slightest desire to rake over old fires, 
or fan flames almost extinct. I speak as a historian. 
I can believe that Dr. Gay was often silent on the five 
points of Calvin, rather than denunciatory. He prob- 
ably emphasized the more persuasive and benignant 
aspects of religion, — appealed rather than threatened, 
reasoned rather than dogmatized, pointed out the 
good in everything rather than criticised theology. 
I should judge that he might have set the example for 
Dr. Freeman by hating bigotry of all kinds. Unitarian 
or Orthodox. Dr. Mayhew and Dr. Chauncy of Bos- 
ton appear after Gay, and just before Freeman, lights 
in the new firmament. You micrht infer that modifica- 



36 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

tions in views like these betokened a wider change 
than individual opinions. Yes ! it was true that the 
opening of this meeting-house was coincident with 
great fermentation in church doctrines and confessions. 
Ministers were modifying their interpretation of the 
Lord's Supper and of Baptism. Arminianism was 
springing up. Whitefield and Jonathan Edwards 
gave the churches " great awakenings." As the years 
rolled on, the Universalists appeared in Murray and 
Ballou, adding another agitating element to the stirring 
drama. Different kinds of Calvinists appeared, includ- 
ing the Hopkinsians. This type finally became the 
well-known New England Theology, while the sterner 
form was perpetuated in Presbyterianism. It does not 
appear that the ministers of this church took aggressive 
prominence in this intense development of theological 
belief, — intense, because heated by personal embitter- 
ment, and inflamed by factions that rent our New 
England churches in twain. When the present century 
began, strifes deepened ; in twenty years the crisis 
came. Channing is there, and Worcester and Ballou 
and Stuart and Woods. Pamphlets reply to pam- 
phlets. The whole land is roused. Princeton and 
Andover answer Boston and Cambridge. The echoes 
of controversy sound in every home and village. 
Parishes quarrel, divide, go to courts. Ministers fall 
out with their parishes, and parishes with their ministers. 
Steadily the Unitarian ideas spread, and find adherents ; 
and with equal steadiness the Trinitarian Congrega- 
tionalists draw to their own centres. This church, .so 



DISCOURSE. T^'J 

far as I can trace its history, has never swerved from a 
broad, inclusive church covenant of the simplest kind. 
It became Unitarian under Dr. Gay, consciously or 
unconsciously, and has been of that faith since. While 
never concealing its own beliefs, or failing to spread 
its banners on the outer walls of denominational work, 
it has respected the sacred sincerity and rights of 
differing Christians. This pulpit has never wandered 
into vagaries, or meddled with idle speculations. It 
has never sought destruction and criticism as its glory. 
It has assailed no denomination or people, but with 
positive and firm utterance proclaimed God a Heav- 
enly Father, Christ man's Guide and Savior, the Holy 
Spirit our ever-present solace and inspiration. This 
meeting-house has, for two hundred years, echoed those 
sentiments which exalt man's hopes and reverently 
present our Maker, by portraying humanity's inborn 
greatness, the beauty of character, the moral atonement, 
the eternal hope of the future, and the claims of an 
honest, upright. Christian life to an immortal inheri- 
tance. Yes ! I may cover the entire two centuries, for 
I find nothing in Norton to refute my statement. Here 
the preachers have taught the nobility of reason, and 
the duty of diligence in studying Scripture. Here the 
comfort of God's love and his nearness have been 
impressed upon the mourner. Youth has heard here 
thrilling words of admonition, based on the belief that 
God gives to each a mission, and that perfection is 
man's goal. Have you departed from the faith con- 
signed to us by serious forefathers .f* No! Outwardly, 



38 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

it might seem so. Truly, no ! We must judge the 
Puritan and his meeting-house by the fruits. You are 
the Puritans' children, and have tried to be faithful 
to the principles they represented. You have been ! 
Could Hobart arise and be a living part of this last 
quarter of the nineteenth century, where do you think 
his fellowship would be ? With you ! Principles grow; 
they are not made. You have unfolded the original 
truths. I am not strenuous for names, and care not 
what we call the victories of religion in the next cen- 
tury; but of this you may be sure, — the face of this 
church fronts the light, it walks the sure path. What 
is that path ? Primarily, it is the logical carrying out 
of the principles our forefathers winnowed from old 
errors, and brought hither to plant in the soil of a new 
Republic. This meeting-house stands for a progressive 
Christianity. The Puritan Commonwealth has failed ; 
it could not be built ; but in its place has arisen a 
Republic, — glory of the ages, hope of the future. 
W^e to-day are celebrating the religious significance of 
this meeting-house. It becomes us to ask, in conclu- 
sion, what lessons specially come home ? What 
constitutes the Puritan's religion of to-day.? It seems 
no boast to say, as we do in our festal hours, that the 
Republic has proved itself capable and enduring. Our 
orators justly point to battle-fields, to wise conduct in 
public crises, to the reserved power that never seems 
to fail our nation. And recently, as eloquence painted 
the lessons of Yorktown, amid them all we heard the 
pleasing statements of a self-sustaining, growing, and 



DISCOURSE. 



39 



self-respecting people, which people the United States 
certainly are. With this new continent in government 
is the new continent of religious belief and life: 
freedom in both, equality in both, co-operation in 
both, — in both the same perils and the same hopes. 
The parallel is close. Men asked : Will the American 
people create wise laws ? It was also asked : Will they 
support worship and religious usages ? Will they be 
an obedient race, loving order and peace ? Will they 
reverence sacred things.'* Will they have a high sense 
of citizenship } Will they bring home to themselves 
moral laws ? Will these builders of new homes respect 
the past and link their lives with old-time examples.'* 
On the other hand, will they think seriously of the 
future and live not for themselves alone, but for 
generations to come ? Will they think, will they act, 
soberly as well as zealously ? WiW they write their 
history in meteoric lines, or carve it faithfully on time's 
granite } 

Slowly the questions are being answered in our civil 
affairs. The respect of the Old World is at last won. 
Our self-regulating power has been tested in so many 
ways that the skeptical are softening, and the doubtful 
grow assured. Our charters and our constitutions 
tell us in simple but impressive language the objects 
and principles for which all this national and state 
government exists. Let us look a moment at the aims 
and laws of religion in a Republic. 

The object of a Republic, expressed succinctly, is to 
assist each man to the possession and employment of 



40 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

his best self. The enjoyment of freedom and the 
pursuit of happiness are means to an end. 

This end of reahzing the most in each, and of 
guaranteeing rights to all, is sought by spreading 
privileges, by opening all paths, by diffusing intelli- 
gence and thrift. Naturally the object of the Christian 
religion, in the midst of such strong incentives would 
be similar. The ministry of religion in a Republic is 
to help every one to the knowledge and use of his best 
self. It is not simply to save him from a future of 
condemnation, or to conciliate a higher power, or to 
solace life's wounds, or to settle doubts of mind. 
These may have been the aims of the past. The 
supreme goal of a pure Christianity is to make every 
human being rich, ripe, and full for the duties and the 
service of a life in this continent. It seeks to open 
his eyes to everything noble ; to strip away bondage of 
superstition ; to spur him with emulation ; to unfold 
every faculty ; to put him at work in mankind s service; 
to tune the single life to the keynote of the highest 
welfare of all ; to locate in his breast guiding precepts ; 
to turn him from traditions to truths, from fear to love ; 
to create a mighty, overpowering sense of joy in the 
obeying of God's laws now ; to unveil the richness of 
this universe, and show him how grand a thing it is to 
explore it ; to fill worship with reality and life ; to lift 
him away from morbid retrospect, or vain anticipation, 
with an eagle's renewed flight, — indeed, to make the 
one man a loyal citizen of the Divine Republic, which 
is righteousness, truth, and love. 



DISCOURSE. 41 

Out of such religious and civil ideas, which our 
fathers planted, which they embodied in the uses of 
this meeting-house, have sprung some ruling sentiments, 
strong alike in law and theology. 

The sacredness of the individual has been enhanced. 
The spiritual worth of every human being has been 
increased by humanitarian labor. Man's kinship with 
a divine source becomes clearer. We are all kings. 
Man's place in the world is rightly settled. The world 
was not made solely for man. The old idea of a 
monarchy favored a crude, crass conception of the 
universe. What history has to say concerning the 
human race is now better understood in the lisfht of 
our institutions. 

The object of a Republic is to make citizens, — citi- 
zens loyal, true, honest. The object of a Republic's 
religion is to make character. The old-world view is 
that religion must be made and presented to the masses. 
If they refuse it in this dogmatic form, denounce them ; 
if they accept blindly, crown them. For our people we 
present a boundless hope. 

Often will it be necessary for the leaders of the peo- 
ple to recall our attention to the first principles of our 
national and religious life. Webster's words at 
Plymouth are ever timely : " Whatever makes men 
good Christians makes them good citizens. Our 
fathers came here to enjoy their religion free and 
unmolested; and at the end of two centuries there is 
nothing upon which we can express a deeper and more 
earnest conviction, than of the inestimable importance 



42 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

of that religion to man, both in regard to this life and 
that which is to come." The progress of our country- 
will not be promoted by discarding religion, but by- 
purifying it of errors, applying its ideas, and incarnating 
its spirit in systems that shall justify our voluntary 
elective methods. Come then, with wider reign, a 
religion of reason and love ! Enter, through the por- 
tals of the future, a lineage of free worshippers, 
reverent, ardent, thoughtful ! Long may this meeting- 
house stand, the home of religious liberty and progress ; 
long may its altar flame be fed by loyal hands ! Reli- 
gion shall enfranchise with hope the weak and poor 
and maimed. It shall be hostile to nothing but crime 
and wrong and error. From the east and the west, 
from the north and the south, shall men come and 
dwell in this Kingdom. " A new heaven and a new 
earth " shall appear, spread by the hand of Him who 
maketh all things new. 

Turn, great wheels of industry; rise, murmur of 
cities ; ripen, ye harvests of unbounded prairies ; circle, 
with your rumbling wheels, tireless traffic and inven- 
tion ; spread in clustered beauty, spire and dome and 
turret ; but, O beloved land, exhibit also rare deeds 
of generosity ; increase thy list of heroes ; kindle new 
altar flames ; enthrone more securely the ideas of truth, 
love, and justice ; and from thy lips never cease 
to say : " God be with us as He was with our 
Fathers." 



Note. — I deem it my duty as well as my pleasure to acknowl- 
edge publicly the help I have received from three gentlemen, — 
zealous and accurate in historical research, — in obtaining material 
and verifying facts : Mr. Quincy Bicknell, Mr. Fearing Burr, and Mr. 
George Lincoln. My authorities for statements I cannot give in 
detail here ; they cover many references. The history of the 
colonial periods is deeply interesting, especially to the people of 
Hingham. 

Edward A. Horton. 



APPENDIX. 



APPENDIX. 



ORDER OF SERVICES. 

January 8, 1882. 



I. ORGAN VOLUNTARY. (^Batiste.) 



II. PASSAGES OF SCRIPTURE. 



III. HYMN. {Flini.) 

Sung to the tune of " Uxbridge." 

In pleasant lands have fallen the lines 
That bound our goodly heritage ; 

And safe beneath our sheltering vines 

Our youth is blessed, and soothed our age. 

What thanks, O God, to thee are due, 
That thou didst plant our fathers here \ 

And watch and guard them as they grew, 
A vineyard to the planter dear. 

The toils they bore, our ease have wrought ; 

They sowed in tears, in joy we reap ; 
The birthright they so dearly bought 

We '11 guard till we with them shall sleep. 

Thy kindness to our fathers shown, 
In weal and woe, through all the past. 

Their grateful sons, O God ! shall own. 
While here their name and race shall last. 



48 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 



IV. SCRIPTURE READING. 

And Solomon stood before the altar of the Lord, in the 
presence of all the congregation of Israel, and spread forth 
his hands toward heaven : 

And he said : Lord God of Israel, there is no God like thee, 
in heaven above, or on earth beneath, who keepest covenant 
and mercy with thy servants that walk before thee with all 
their heart. 

If thy people go out to battle against their enemy, whither- 
soever thou shalt send them, and shall pray unto the Lord 
toward the city which thou hast chosen, and toward the house 
that I have built for thy name, 

Then hear thou in heaven their prayer and their supplica- 
tion, and maintain their cause. 

If they sin against thee (for there is no man that sinneth 
not), and thou be angry with them and deliver them to the 
enemy, so that they carry them away captives unto the land of 
the enemy, far or near ; 

Yet if they shall bethink themselves in the land whither 
they were carried captives, and repent, and make supplication 
unto thee in the land of them that carried them captives, 
saying, We have sinned, and have done perversely, we have 
committed wickedness ; 

Then hear thou their prayer and their supplication in heaven 
thy dwelling place, and maintain their cause, 

For they be thy people, and thine inheritance, which thou 
broughtest forth out of Egypt, from the midst of the furnace 
of iron. 

And it was so that when Solomon had made an end of 
praying all this prayer and supplication unto the Lord, he 
arose from before the altar of the Lord, from kneeling on his 
knees with his hands spread up to heaven. 

And he stood and blessed all the congregation of Israel with 
a loud voice, saying : 



APPENDIX. 



49 



Blessed be the Lord that hath given rest unto his people 
Israel, according to all that he promised ; there hath not failed 
one word of all his good promise, which he promised by the 
hand of Moses his servant. 

The Lord our God be with us, as he was with our fathers ; 
let him not leave us nor forsake us : 

That he may incline our hearts unto him, to walk in all his 
ways, and to keep his commandments, and his statutes, and 
his judgments, which he commanded our fathers. 

And let these my words, wherewith I have made suppHcation 
before the Lord, be nigh unto the Lord our God day and night, 
that he maintain' the cause of his servant, and the cause of his 
people Israel at all times, as the matter shall require : 

That all the people of the earth may know that the Lord is 
God, and that there is none else. 

Let your heart therefore be perfect with the Lord our God, 
to walk in his statutes and to keep his commandments, as at 
this day. 

V. PRAYER. 

Almighty and most merciful God : we thank thee for the 
privilege granted unto us of assembling here this morning, 
with our psalms of praise, our thanksgiving of prayer, our 
words of tribute. In thy sight the centuries are but as days. 
The nations of this earth rise and fall, but thou art the same. 
May the lessons of this hour impress us with a new and deeper 
sense of life. We thank thee for the noble ancestry which 
now receives our honor. Those of old braved the ocean, con- 
quered the wilderness, and set the free church and state in the 
waste land of a New World. They came impelled by the truths 
of Christianity to do the work for which a grateful world pays 
them homage. They were in the line of martyrs and reformers. 
These walls they reared. Here the fire of loyalty to God was 
fanned, here they pledged themselves to unyielding fidehty, 

4 



50 THE FIRST PARISH IN HIxNGHAM. 

here the vows of Christian service were made. Again we 
seem to see the brave, earnest faces, and hear the strong, tri- 
umphant voices that were of the first worship offered in this 
venerable house. We thank thee that by the power of spir- 
itual sympathy we can ally ourselves at this hour with those 
of old whose lives, prayers, and labors have wrought for us 
such boons and privileges. We remember at this time all for 
whom we should pray: the weary, the sick, the tempted, — 
asking that the precious aid which the spirit of religion affords 
may be with such. We remember the homes represented 
here, and ask that the children in them, whose voices are as 
sweet music, and their faces as sunshine, may be blest in a 
ripening manhood and womanhood ; that the gray-haired sires 
may enjoy the happy retrospect of peaceful, honored old age ; 
that those bearing the burdens of public and private life may 
be strong and devoted. Make to appear now, in our thoughts, 
all of the past which may assist our worship and exercises at 
this time. Memory is busy, the heart stirs with emotion, 
vanished forms and hushed accents return ; turn all these 
impressions and feelings and recollections to our good. May 
the gentle presence of him so recently the shepherd of this 
flock seem to be with us, a benediction and an inspiration. 
Make us loyal to this beloved land, and quicken in us all true 
sentiments of love and reverence for the great institutions 
that ennoble our Repubhc. Above all, may we maintain a 
profound allegiance to the Christian truths to which sire and 
son are alike indebted for guidance here and hope hereafter. 
So assist us that our sins may be abandoned and our disciple- 
ship to Christ made stronger. We ask thy blessing on this 
service, on this beloved people, on the cause of our lathers, on 
the hopes of thy children everywhere, — as disciples of Jesus 
Christ. Amen. 



VI. ORGAN RESPONSE. 



APPENDIX. 51 



VII. HYMN. {W. P. Lunt.) 

Sung to the tune of " lizard'" 

When, driven by oppression's rod, 
Our fathers fled beyond the sea, 

Their care was first to worship God, 
And next to leave their children free. 

Above the forest's gloomy shade 
The altar and the school appeared : 

On that, the gifts of faith were laid ; 

In this, their precious hopes were reared. 

The altar and the school still stand, 
The sacred pillars of our trust ; 

And freedom's sons shall fill the land 
When we are sleeping in the dust. 

Before thine altar. Lord, we bend, 
With grateful song and fervent prayer ; 

For thou, who wast our fathers' friend, 
Wilt make our offspring still thy care. 

VIII. DISCOURSE. 



IX. PRAYER. 



X. HYMN. {Pierfiont.) 

Sung to the tune of "America." 

Gone are those great and good 
Who here in peril stood, 

And raised their hymn. 
Peace to the reverend dead ! 
The light that on their head 
The passing years have shed 

Shall ne'er grow dim. 



52 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

Ye temples, that to God 
Rise where our fathers trod, 

Guard well your trust, — 
The faith that dared the sea, 
The truth that made them free, 
Their cherished purity, 

Their garnered dust. 

Thou high and holy One, 
Whose care for sire and son 

All nature fills, — 
While day shall break and close. 
While night her crescent shows. 
Oh let thy light repose 

On these our hills. 



XI. BENEDICTION. 



APPENDIX. 



53 



CHURCH IN HINGHAM, ENGLAND. 

The following sketch is taken from " An Essay towards a 
Topographical History of the County of Norfolk, by Francis 
Blomefield, Rector of Fersfield in Norfolk. London, 1805." 

HINGHAM. 

HiNGHAM was the head town of the deanery, and at first 
contained 43 parishes. The deanery was taxed at 30j- and it 
was in the Bishop's collation. 

The Church is a good pile, the tower being very tall and 
large ; the whole was rebuilt by Remiguis de HetJierscte, rec- 
tor here, in the time of King Edzvard III. with the assistance 
of John le Marshal, his patron, who contributed much to the 
perfecting of the work; it is dedicated to St. Andrew the 
Apostle, and had several chapels in it, of which the most 
remarkable were at the ends of each isle, that on the north 
side being dedicated to the Holy Trinity, and that on the 
south side to the Holy Virgin ; the others were dedicated to 
St. Nicholas, the Nativity of the Virgin, and to her Assump- 
tion, there was also a St. Marys chapel by the rood altar, 
and another of St. Maty of Pity, and there were no less 
than seven gilds held in the church, viz. of St. James, Corpus 
Chris ti, St. Andrew, Holy-Cross, A I I- Saints, St. John Baptist, 
and St. Mary, and each having a stipendiary chaplain, serv- 
ing at their altars in the church, constituted a choir; for 
in 1484, Robert Morley, Esq. of this town was buried in the 
church, and gave seven surplices to the quire of Hingham ; 
and without doubt this church must make a fine appearance 
in those times, it being adorned with the following images, all 
which had lights, cither lamps, wax tapers, or candles, con- 
stantly burning before them in time of divine service, and 



54 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

being dispersed all over the church, chancel, and chapels, 
must make it in the night season a fine sight; the principal 
image of St. Andrew stood (as the principal image or Patron 
saint of every church did) in the chancel, on the north side 
of the altar, and those of St. Peter, St. Michael, St. Alary, 
Corpus Christi, St. Maigaret, St. Christin, St. EditJi or Sythe, 
St. Mary of Pity, St. Thomas, the Nativity and Assumption of 
the Holy Virgin, St. Wulstan, St. Appolonia, St. Christopher, 
St. Erasmus, St. yulian, St. Anthony, St. y<?//« Baptist, St. 
Nicholas, the //(?/j/ Trinity, St. Edmund, St. Laurence, St. Gz^"/^- 
m;z^, St. ^(9//;^ the Evangelist, St. Valentine, St. Ethelred, and 
the //t'/;/ y?(?t?^ or Cr^i'j-, which stood on the rood-loft, between 
the church and the chancel. 

When Norwich Domesday was wrote, the patronage was 
late Sir yohn Marshals but then the Lord Morleys ; the 
rector had a noble house, and 20 acres of ground, the living 
being then valued at 50 marks ; it stands in the King's Books 
at 24/. i8j. /^d. and pays 2/. gs. lod. yearly tenths, and 
first fruits every vacancy, it being undischarged ; the synodals 
are 2s. Sd. and Peter-pence is. 2d. ob. The town paid 7/. 
each tenth. 

[Then follows a list of Rectors, beginning with Master Richard de 
Felmingham in 1272 ; and among them appears the following : — ] 

1605, 7 Jan. Robert Peck, A.M. 



APPENDIX. 55 



ROBERT PECK. 

Rev. Robert Peck was ordained Teacher of the church 
Nov. 28, 1638. In the " Peck Genealogy," by Ira G. Peck, 
we find the following account of him : — 

Rev. Robert Peck was born at Beccles, Suffolk County, England, 
in 1580. He was graduated at Magdalen College, Cambridge; the 
degree of A.B. was conferred upon him in 1599, and that of A.M. 
in 1603. He was set apart to the ministry, and inducted over 
the church at Hingham, Norfolk County, England, Jan. 8, 1605, 
where he remained until 1638, when he fled from the persecutions 
of the Church to this country. 

He was a talented and influential clergyman, a zealous preacher, 
and a non-conformist to the superstitions, ceremonies, and corrup- 
tions of the church, for which he was persecuted and driven from 
the countr}'. Brook, in his Lives of the Puritans, gives many facts 
of interest in relation to him. In particular, giving some of the 
offences for which he and his followers were persecuted, he says : 
" For having catechised his family, and sung a psalm in his own 
house on a Lord's day evening, when some of his neighbors at- 
tended, his lordship (Bishop Harsnet) enjoined all who were 
present to do penance, requiring them to say, ' I confess my 
errors,' etc." 

Those who refused were immediately excommunicated and re- 
quired to pay heavy costs. This, Mr. Brook says, appears from the 
bishop's manuscripts under his own hands. He says, " He was 
driven from his flock, deprived of his benefice, and forced to seek 
his bread in a foreign land." 

He arrived here in 1638. In relation to his arrival the town clerk 
of Hingham here says : " Mr. Robert Peck, preacher of the gospel 
in the town of Hingham, in the County of Norfolk, old England, 
with his wife and two children and two servants, came over the sea 
and settled in the town of Hingham, and he was a Teacher of the 
Church." Mr. Hobart, of Hingham, says in his diary, that he 
was ordained here Teacher of the church, Nov. 28, 1638. His 



56 THE FIRST PARISH IN HINGHAM. 

name frequently appears upon the records of the town. He had 
lands granted him. His family consisted of nine children. He 
remained here until the long Parliament, or until the persecu- 
tions in England ceased, when he returned and resumed his rec- 
torship at Hingham. Mr. Hobart says he returned Oct. 27, 1641. 

He died at Hingham, England, and was buried in his church- 
yard there. 

Cotton Mather, in his " Magnalia Christi Americana," has 
the following : — 

Mr. Robert Peck. — This light, having been by the persecut- 
ing prelates ' put under a bushel,' was, by the good providence of 
Heaven, fetched away into New England, about the year 1638, 
where the good people of our Hingham did ' rejoice in the light 
for a season.' But within two or three years, the invitation of his 
friends at Hingham in England persuaded him to a return unto 
them ; where being, though a great person for stature, yet a greater 
for spirit, he was greatly serviceable for the good of the church, 

Blomefield, in his " Essay " already referred to, speaks of 
Robert Peck among the rectors of the church in Hingham, 
England. A more particular and candid account would be 
desirable, but we must remember the spirit which moved the 
writer to his work, — Blomefield being a churchman and Peck 
a non-conformist. 

He says : — 

1605, 7 Jan. Robert Peck, A.M. Tho. Moor, by grant of Fraiicis 
Lovell, Knt. he was " a man of a very violent schismatical spirit, he 
pulled down the rails, and levelled the altar and the whole chancel 
a foot below the church, as it remains to this day, but being pros- 
ecuted for it by Bishop Wren, he fled the kingdom, and went 
over into New-England, with many of his parishioners, who sold 
their estates for half their value, and conveyed all their effects to 
that new plantation, erected a town and colonic, by the name of 
Hingham, where many of their posterity are still remaining, he 
promised never to desert them, but hearing that Bishops were 
deposed, he left them all to shift for themselves, and came back 
to Hingham in the year 1646, after 10 years voluntary banish- 



APPENDIX. 57 

ment, he resumed his rectory, and died in the year 1656." His 
funeral sermon was preached by Nathaniel jfoceline, A.M. pastor of 
the Church of Hardinghavi, and was pubhshed by him, being dedi- 
cated to Mr. John Sid/e\\ high-sheriff, Brainpton-Gurdon and Mr. 
Day, Justices of the Peace, Mr. Church, Mr. Barnhanty and Mr. 
Man, aldermen and justices in the city of Norwich. 

163S, 25 May, Luke Skippon, A.M. was presented by Sir Thomas 
WooDHOUSE, Knt. and Bart, as on Peck's death, he having been 
absent about two years; and in 

1640, II April, the said Z//^r was reinstituted, the living being 
void by lapse, it appearing that Peck was alive since Skippon'' s first 
institution, and now two years more being past, and he not appear- 
ing, it lapsed to the Crown, as on Peck's death ; but in 

1646/ Peck came again, and held it to his death, 

1 1641, according to Hobart's Diary. 



THE COMMUNION SERVICE. 



The Communion Service comprises fourteen silver 
cups, three plates, and two tankards. According to the 
inscriptions upon the cups two were 

" The Gift of M'. 

Preserved Hall 

to y*^ first Church of 

Christ in Hingham." 

Two were 

"The Gift of M^= Hannah Thaxter (Relict of the Hon^'^ 

Sam'. Thaxter) to the first Church of Christ in Hingham, 

1756." 

Two were 

"The Gift of M-;^ Elizabeth Beal (Relict of 

M'. Daniel Beal) to the first Church in Hingham 

1769." 

Six were 

"Presented to the first Church in Hingham 

by M':" Sarah Derby 

once the confort of Dr Ezekiel Hearsey 

1790." 

Two were 

" Bequeathed by the widow Ruth Leavitt, 

to the first Ciiurch in Hingham 

1794." 






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